Statistics and Polls

After reading over a certain thread this morning regarding the outcome of a certain poll, I have to post this - I welcome your intelligent challenges to this personal belief of mine.

Statistics and Polls == Bullshit.

Why? Statistics can be and usually are slanted to the beliefs of the person accumulating them. Polls are too. The questions asked even from a 'unbiased' cross-section of our society cannot be stated so as to objectively garner any information whatsoever, nor can these results be accumulated by an unbiased individual.

Why? Cross sections of society are just that - cross sections. They're weighted by race/religious creed/sexual preference/education/economic factors, etc. They never accurately represent society at large - and it's impossible to poll everyone and get your results correct - just ask the census bureau, then ask me about the census taker I threw off my front porch because he wanted to see my tax return.

I maintain that it is impossible to keep bias out of anything in respect to public opinions about this or that, or which software is "safest". Any challenges?

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Statistics can be and usually are slanted to the beliefs of the person accumulating them.

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lol. Yeah happens all the time. They teach that to us in my English class. Basicly making your own propaganda out of something completely opposite.

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I maintain that it is impossible to keep bias out of anything in respect to public opinions about this or that, or which software is "safest". Any challenges?

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No challenges here! Most people have never even seen or even heard of Linux/Unix! And when something happens(ie. windoze crashes) someone always says "ah that always happens" or something along that line. Thus people are conditioned to accepting the norms of crappy software and never venture out to other progs.

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Cross sections of society are just that - cross sections. They're weighted by race/religious creed/sexual preference/education/economic factors, etc.

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BlackIce - I think you are on to something here. Since these polls are "weighted", and not truly "random" doesn't this make these Polls politically incorrect? And possibly even a grandiose form of discrimination? I mean, my vote in the poll will be not counted or in the least it will be normalized to make room for a minority or special intrest group opinion that will be weighed more heavily than mine and ensure bull**** er I mean equality in the sample. Just wondering?

I totally agree, and I didn't realize how true that was until I took two statistics classes...Holy cow! Just goes to show that sometimes no one's more wrong than the consensus. ;)